


The Last Temptation of Remus J. Lupin

by kaiz



Category: Harry Potter - Rowling
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2003-12-07
Updated: 2003-12-07
Packaged: 2017-10-09 18:44:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,479
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/90393
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kaiz/pseuds/kaiz
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>What was Remus thinking when Snape brought him the Wolfsbane potion in PoA?</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Last Temptation of Remus J. Lupin

> The door opened, and in came Snape. He was carrying a goblet, which was smoking faintly, and stopped at the sight of Harry, his black eyes narrowing.
> 
> "Ah, Severus," said Lupin, smiling. "Thanks very much. Could you leave it here on the desk for me?"

...

Remus Lupin looked over his shoulder, then pulled up his hood and plunged into the seedy depths of Knockturn Alley. As he walked, a light, freezing rain began to fall, coating the cobblestones with a greasy rime. He glanced around at the dark figures slouched along the walls--prostitutes, pimps, pickpockets, and con-men--and took care to watch his footing. It wouldn't do to break an ankle in this section of town. No, not at all.

The sun had set a few hours earlier and the narrow, dirty streets were bustling with illicit commerce. Witches and wizards thronged the area, in addition to a few individuals whose gender, not to mention species, was open to debate. Roadside buskers added their loud, off-key and off-color music to the sounds of haggling, the shouted arguments, and the ever-present clink of coin exchanged. Vendors hawked their dubious wares: "Gen-u-ine Unicorn Bollocks, here! Only twenty galleons each!" And the icy wind howled along the streets, swirling trash and loose dirt about and whipping the street lamps and torches into a sinister, sputtering dance.

All in all, it was a long way from the quiet little country lane where he and Sirius shared a small cottage.

Suddenly, a young boy broke free of the shadows and ran up to him, hand out. "Spare a few knuts, Mister? For a bit of supper?" The boy wore threadbare robes and boots with no laces.

His sympathy roused, Remus considered for a moment. Then he noticed the small horde of similarly ill-dressed children who stood off to one side, eyes glittering.

Though something in his stomach twisted, he shook his head and silently pushed past the boy.

"Sodding cheap bastard!"

He was streetwise enough to side-step the weak hexes that the children threw after him once his back was turned.

Unsettled, Remus hastened his step and pulled his cloak tighter around himself. With each icy gust of wind, he thought of those hollow-eyed, shivering children and gave silent thanks for his warm cloak and new leather gloves. Both were Christmas gifts from Sirius.

The address he sought was well off the beaten track and as he wended his way through the maze of narrow, dirty lanes, Remus wondered--not for the first time-what had possessed him to make this trip at all.

He'd grown up on half-heard whispers from his parents about the scum who inhabited Knockturn Alley. Men and women who'd sell anything--or anyone--for a quick profit. And though they never discussed it openly, he'd known that many a foul-tasting, "Guaranteed sure fire cure!" they'd given him had been purchased on these same grubby streets.

As a student, Sirius had occasionally dragged him, James, and Peter through the square. It was a game then, a delicious adolescent thrill. Taking in the odd sights, poking fun at the hags, mocking the pitiful wares of third-rate spell merchants, outrunning the hexes thrown by some outraged drunk or indigent that one of them, Sirius most often, had offended.

The amusement had worn thin once they'd left school and Lord Voldemort had begun his ascendance. Remus had found steady employment as a teacher for a small, but prestigious, wizarding academy and his position was far too precious--and dependent upon his good reputation--to risk it unnecessarily. These days, he avoided Knockturn Alley as if it were the full moon.

Then too, he'd been given as good as a direct order by Dumbledore to "curb his curiosity."

"It is a malicious illusion, Remus," Dumbledore had said with nary a twinkle in his eye. "You know it as well as I. Talented wizards have worked the problem for centuries and yet a cure has remained elusive. Voldemort is only preying on the desperate with these rumors. I won't have you risking your life and livelihood to chase down a cruel myth on behalf of the Order."

Sirius and James were far more blunt. "Voldemort is a lying sack of shit. What better way for the slimy bastard to build up an army, to recruit the gullible and feeble-minded to his cause than to promise them a cure? Thank Merlin you're smarter than that, Moony!"

Remus had believed them.

While at Hogwarts, he'd discreetly researched the problem himself. He had studied the Curse, the theory behind the attempts at a cure, he'd read of the horrors--painful deaths, men trapped in wolf-form forever--that had resulted. Oh yes, he knew the literature inside and out.

And yet, here he was in Knockturn Alley after sundown. Off to the _Scrofulous Skrewt_. To meet a somewhat uncomfortable friend: Magda Collins. And to find out if the desperate wish that every werewolf, even those who sneered at the notion ("If that witch ain't wearin' a glamor, then this bottle of Ogden's is the Wolfsbane!"), secretly hoped for had come true.

Those uneasy thoughts accompanied him the rest of his walk. A short while later, he turned down Dragon's Head Lane, pushed through the crowd--keeping a firm hand on his wallet all the while--and finally, up the worn, sloping stairs into the crowded pub itself.

The room was packed with bodies of all shapes, sizes, and species. It reeked of wet wool, spilled beer, rancid oil, and hex residue. Dense bluish smoke hung over the heads of the patrons and he could barely see from one end of the room to the other. How the hell was he going to find Mags?

Remus shouldered his way up to the sticky, pitted bar and yelled for the barkeep; might as well fortify himself with some liquid courage, even if the vintage was a bit dodgy. Before the huge, gap-toothed man had made his way over, Remus felt someone tug on his arm and he turned. Short, skinny, a mop of frizzy red hair, and incongruously round red cheeks. It was Mags.

"Oi, Remy. This way."

With that, she grabbed his hand and dragged him through the crush towards a booth in the far corner. A few scruffy characters were eyeing their table but Mags bared her teeth at them. "Piss off, you!" she snarled, five foot, two inches of foul-mouthed, foul-tempered impending mayhem. For good measure, Remus made as if to slip his wand out of its sheath in his sleeve. The lurkers, not a one of them less than six foot and 17 stone apiece, wisely took the hint and moved off.

Mags's bright green eyes narrowed for a moment as she scanned the length of his sleeve, then she plunked herself down on one side of the rickety table. She pushed a foaming tankard towards him. "Here. Already got us some drinks. Ol' Maud's finest. 'S the best they got."

Remus doffed his gloves and cloak then took his seat. Given the state of the bench and table, the _Impervious_ charm he'd put on his clothing had been a good idea. He hefted the mug and smiled a bit. _Old Maud's._ Sirius would tease him into the next century for drinking this stuff. _Hippogryff piss,_ he called it.

...

> Snape set down the smoking goblet, his eyes wandering between Harry and Lupin.
> 
> "I was just showing Harry my grindylow," said Lupin pleasantly, pointing at the tank.
> 
> "Fascinating," said Snape, without looking at it. "You should drink that directly, Lupin."
> 
> "Yes, Yes, I will," said Lupin.

...

"So. Look at you," Mags said, peering over the rim of her own tankard with a mustache of foam over her lip. "Fine cloak, fancy clothes. A regular gentleman and all!"

In contrast, Mags was wearing well-worn and second-hand everything, from her patched and shabby robe to the battered woolen gloves that she'd shoved into the sleeve of her equally moth-eaten jumper.

The silvery scars on her forearms were visible through the holes.

Remus felt an unpleasant squirm in his stomach. "I'm doing well enough, I suppose." He muttered a purification charm under his breath and took a cautious sip of his beer.

"Well enough, he says!" Mags scoffed, slamming her mug on the table. "Such pretty little words, too. I can remember long ago you spoke only a bit better'n me. And here you are, with pro-nun-ci-a-tion fit for Merlin's own table! 'S that what you learned in that fancy school of yours?" Her words were light and friendly but carried a bitter aftertaste.

The sick feeling in his stomach intensified. "So how are you doing, Mags? It's been a while."

"It has, at that," she said with a grin, but Remus still felt the rebuke as if she'd slapped him in the face. "I've been good, Remy, damn good. 'Ve got steady work now, that pays a good wage. And a couple o' projects on the side that're turning a decent profit." She took a long draught of the beer then smiled at him. It wasn't an especially friendly smile. "But none o' that's why you're here, now is it? None of it's why _you_ owled _me._"

Remus stifled a sigh. Mags was as insightful as she was blunt. "I do care how you've been, Mags," he said, and he truly meant it. It was just that...In the years he'd been away at school, returning home only for the summers, and in the years since he'd got the teaching position and finally moved away...the sunny little girl with whom he'd grown up, with whom he'd been "Friends forever!", had run wild through the hills, and caught frogs and butterflies, and invented nonsense spells and hexes, with whom he'd encountered a werewolf one fateful night of a full moon...had slowly, bit by bit, become this angry and bitter young woman. Someone whom he hardly knew. Someone that it hurt him, in a secret, unnameable place, to know. "I'm sorry that I've been a bit out of touch lately," he finished lamely.

"Lately!" Her expression darkened momentarily, but then she shook her head. "Look, it's not like I don't unnerstand, cos I do." And unfortunately, from the hard glint in her eye, Remus saw that she did. "You're runnin' with a new pack now, Remy. One that's not for the likes of me."

"That's not true!" he wanted to say, but she held up her hand.

"We was kids, then, I know. It's all different now. I wouldn't a-sso-si-ate with me neither. Nor this lot," she jabbed a thumb at the other patrons in the tavern, "if I had the chance otherwise."

Remus swallowed hard against the lump in his throat.

"And see, that's just the thing, Remy, and I know it's why you've come," Mags said, leaning towards him and lowering her voice. "I might jus' get that chance. But not jus' me. _All of us might._" She gave him a sly wink then drained her tankard and set it on the table with a thump.

He felt as if he'd run headlong into brick wall. "What?"

A plump, harried-looking barmaid squeezed past their booth at that moment and Mags flagged her down. "Another round for me and m' mate!"

"You ain't paid for the last one," the woman said, hand on hip, glaring impartially at both him and Mags.

Her expression turned calculating when Remus flipped her a few coins. "And bring back some snacks, too," he called as she sauntered back through the crush of patrons, winking at him over her shoulder.

Remus pushed his own tankard over to Mags. She grinned at him and took it as if it were her due. "'S thirsty work, all this reminiscin'," she said with an ironic quirk of her eyebrow.

He nodded slowly. His stomach felt queasy and his back and shoulders were tight. "Now, what do you mean, Mags," he said, leaning forward, "that 'all of us might.'"

Mags took a deep draught from the mug then set it aside. "'Zackly that, Remy," she said. "The Ministry's ground us down and underfoot for too long, like so much trash. No schoolin', no wands, damned tattoos, registries, and no bloody jobs. All cuz we all ran into a bit o' bad luck once, on a full moon night. That's like to change, and soon, if _he_ has his way."

Despite the oppressive heat in the room, a shiver rippled down Remus's spine. "He _who,_ Mags? Voldemort?" It was ridiculous, but he couldn't help but whisper the name.

"Think on it, Remy," she said harshly and reached out to grip his forearm. "No more basements and sheds with rats and padlocks and chains. No more cages. No more of _these,_" she pushed back her sleeves and brandished her scars. "Even someone so well-kept as you should 'preciate that."

Remus shook his head. His limbs felt oddly light but his middle felt as if he'd swallowed a brick of lead.

"It's not true, Mags, it can't be," he thickly. "I want to believe it as much as you do. But it's a lie, a myth. It's impossible. Wizards have tried for centuries and every single one of them have failed."

Mags sat back on the bench and clucked her tongue like an old aunt. "Oh, but that's where you're wrong, Remy. You might have learned a whole lot in that fancy Scottish school of yours, but this time, _I'm_ the one that knows what's what." All of winter was in her voice and her eyes were as hard as polished agate. "You might be smart, and all them old wizard bastards what mucked about with it might've been smart, too. But see, now there's somebody else who's _smarter._ Somebody who's actually made it to work!"

...

> "I made an entire cauldronful," Snape continued. "If you need more.
> 
> "I should probably take some again tomorrow. Thanks very much, Severus."
> 
> "Not at all," said Snape, but there was a look in his eye Harry didn't like. He backed out of the room, unsmiling and watchful.
> 
> Harry looked curiously at the goblet. Lupin smiled.
> 
> "Professor Snape has very kindly concocted a potion for me," he said. "I have never been much of a potion-brewer and this one is particularly complex." He picked up the goblet and sniffed it. "Pity sugar makes it useless," he added, taking a sip and shuddering.

...

The barmaid chose that moment to return with their beer and several bowls of scampi and chips. The smell made his unsettled stomach roil. He pushed the bowls over to Mags. She set upon them as if she'd been starving.

Perhaps she had.

Remus closed his eyes briefly and wiped the sweat from his upper lip. All the while, the words, _It can't be true, it can't be true, it can't possibly, possibly be true,_ rang in his mind. "I'm sorry, Mags, but. I just. Okay, look, you say it's real. That it works. How? Do you know?"

"Oh, it's not a cure, Remy, no," she mumbled around a mouthful of chips. "But it's bloody close. Closer than anybody's got, _ever._"

He couldn't quite seem to take a deep enough breath. "How close?"

Mags licked her fingers and eyed him smugly. "Close enough that when the change comes, you're still _you,_ but jus' wearnin' the shape of the wolf."

There was a strange buzzing in his ears. "A rumor, nothing more."

"It's more'n a rumor, mate. Ya see, I know," Mags drawled, "because _I've tried it._"

Remus nearly bit through his tongue.

They could know about the Order, he thought frantically, they could know about _him!_ Who knew if Snape had kept his word to Dumbledore and told no one? And Snape was rumored to be involved with Voldemort. Mags could be a plant, a spy meant to tempt him to turn...Oh, but her eyes were so bright, so triumphant, her face was so open, and never once in eighteen years of complicated friendship had they ever lied to one another, not when it counted.

"'S a potion. Tastes like doxy piss, I swear," Mags was saying, "but works a treat, it does. And when the change comes, oh, it still hurts. But when it's done, Remy, you're still _you._" She laughed with obvious delight. "No bites, no madness. No _hunger,_ you know? You're just you. Yourself. Most amazing thing, you can't even imagine."

"I want to," he heard himself say.

"I jus' bet that you do," she smirked. "Can't be all that easy, you findin' a private spot to turn into a monster once a month, what with that high class company you keepin' these days."

"Mags, I." Remus shook his head, in denial or dismay he wasn't certain. "I don't know what to say."

"Yeah, well, don' feel too bad, eh?" She patted his hand with greasy, work-chapped fingers. "After all them games we played as kids, 'Merlin and Morgana,' dreamin' we'd be the next Great Ones. Then you went off to school. Ha! Who'd a thought it'd be me that was making history, not you?"

"So tell me," Remus finally managed to say, through lips gone numb and stiff, "how did you hear of it? Who makes it? What's in it, do you know?"

Mags chuckled. "I knew you'd be bustin' full of questions, Remy." She took a gulp of Old Maud's then wiped her mouth on her sleeve. "So look, I'll put you outta your misery and tell you straight up. I found out the usual way. Friend of a friend, you know?

"Run into him outside of _Borgin and Burkes,_ day after the full moon. He's looking all bright-eyed and sleek, like you. I'm wearin' long sleeves and bandages, feeling like I got stomped by a troll. 'Mags,' he says, 'you're lookin' like shit.' 'Piss off,' I tell him. He jus laughs, says, 'Look here, I know somebody who'll set you to rights. Works for the new Lord, he does. He's mastered the _Wolfsbane,_ and he's always after volunteers. You wanna meet'im?' Now, I don't have your schoolin', Remy, but I'm not stupid. So I want to know, 'How much?' He laughs again, says, 'Don't cost ya nuthin'. They pays _you_ to try it out.'

"They pay _me_? Ha! Seems too good to be true, all of it, you know? But, I figure, what the hell? What've got to lose, eh, if I jus' go round and check it out? My job don't pay all _that_ good, and me and Colleen gotta eat somehow. What with her growin' like a bloody weed these days."

_It can't be true, it can't be true, it can't possibly, possibly be true._ "So you went to meet...who?"

"Some bloke, dunno his full name." Mags shrugged. "It's all hush-hush, you know. He only ever calls me 'Miss Collins,' all polite-like, and I calls him 'Mister Es.' Tall, skinny fella with long dark hair. A bit snarly, but a good enough sort."

Mags's casual words slammed through his skull, obliterating the last bit of uncertainty--and hope--that Remus hadn't even realized he'd been hoarding.

"Smart as a whip-crack, that one. Some kinda genius, I hear. Went to that school of yours, Hogwarts. Hey, you might even know'im!"

...

> "Why --?" Harry began. Lupin looked at him and answered the unfinished question.
> 
> "I've been feeling a bit off-color," he said. "This potion is the only thing that helps. I am very lucky to be working alongside Professor Snape; there aren't many wizards who are up to making it."
> 
> Professor Lupin took another sip and Harry had a crazy urge to knock the goblet out of his hands.
> 
> "Professor Snape's very interested in the Dark Arts, he blurted out.

...

Severus Snape knew the Dark Arts like werewolves knew the phases of the moon. And when it came to potion making, everyone--the staff included--knew that Snape was a virtuoso. "A brilliant, creative thinker, if greatly unorthodox in his approach to the art," he'd once heard heard their Potions Master say of Snape. There was not a shred of doubt in his mind that the boy Sirius had called 'Poor Ickle Snivellus' had grown up to become the wizard who'd invented the Wolfsbane.

Remus wanted to cover his ears and wail his denial of it all.

"He's got this whole gang of people working for him on it," Mags was saying, "trackin' results and such, but he's the one tells'em what's what. Says he tossed around the problem for a while, an' took an angle that was skew to all the rest. 'Stead of looking for a full on cure, he tries for halfway, ya see? He fiddles with it a while, and voila, the _Wolfsbane._"

"Just like that," Remus said faintly.

Mags shrugged again. "Rumor has it that he met up with one of _us_ night of a full moon. Barely escaped with his life. Sort of thing that makes an impression on a man, eh?"

Remus was very glad, then, that he hadn't eaten the scampi. Otherwise, he knew he would have spewed it all over the table. He remembered, all too vividly, the wand pointed at his face, held by a thin, shaking hand, the look of horror and revulsion on Severus's face, his screams of, "Keep away from me, you filthy, disgusting _animal!_" in the infirmary on that morning...after.

It made no sense and yet, it also made all the sense in the world. "He's testing it," Remus heard himself say, regardless, "this powerful, untried magic, and he's testing it on _you._"

Mags looked at him as if he'd lost his mind. "What of it? They gotta make sure it works somehow, don't they?" She polished off the rest of her beer and claimed Remus's untouched mug for her own. "He said they'd used it on animals first, but hey, at some point, you gotta try it out on a human, right?"

Remus clasped his hands together under the table to keep them from shaking.

"And hey, he gives you a bit o' money to try it. You jus' sign some papers, write down all the things you eat, and such, during the month. Choke down the potion and answer some questions afterwards. They even give you supper and a nice room, bed and all, for when the change comes."

"But Mags..." There were no words to give voice to his...his everything: horror, joy, jealousy, to untangle the conflict that lurched in his guts with every word that Mags spoke. He'd been prepared for Dumbledore's 'illusion.' He'd been prepared to write off his friend's tale--"Old Crazy Mags, off on another wild chase!" Nothing _ever_ could have prepared him for it to be true. "Mags..." He cleared his throat. "All of the things that could go wrong with it..."

Oh, but he'd known Snape for seven long years. Persnickety bastard that he was, he would have controlled for every variable, prepared a counter for every possible negative outcome. Remus clenched his teeth. Why couldn't he simply _listen,_ make polite noises, then get the hell out? Why did his tongue insist upon running away with him?

Mags's eyes narrowed. "Whatsa matter with you, Remy? Don't you know it means?" She ticked off the points on her fingers. "No more losing work cuz we can't make it in a few days a month. No more schools or landlords or barkeeps turnin' us away in case we somehow infect somebody just by breathin'. And the Ministry! They'll be forced to give back everything they took away." Her mouth was set in a hard, angry line. "I'da figured you be all for it, but maybe I shoulda expected otherwise. It's well and fine for _you_ to sit there and pick my luck apart. With your oh-so superior logic and education, your fancy friends, your connections and _your wand,_" she sneered. "Not not all of us have grandparents who had a bit o' dirt from way back on the Headmaster of Hogwarts."

Her words sank their poisoned fangs deeply in his throat. "Mags, no," he gasped, "that's not what I meant. Not what I meant at all." Something inside him writhed and gasped like a fish on a hook. "You're right, it _is_ a good thing. A wonderful thing. It's just that I'm worried." _Liar!_ his conscience sneered. "What about Colleen? What if something goes wrong with this? What if something happens to you?"

And wasn't that exactly like something...something subtly disapproving and unsatisfying that Dumbledore would say? Shouldn't he shake his head sadly now? Pat her on the shoulder, say something about responsibility and the needs of others, not the hopeless dreams of the few?

Mags clenched her fists and glared at him. "I'm doing this _for_ Colleen, you git. Ta give her a better chance. T'ain't her fault that her da up and left and mum is a werewolf, now is it?" She leaned forward and jabbed her finger in his face. "And I would'a thought somebody like you'd'a tried to help us out, you know? Somebody who got bit but kept it hid, got himself an education. Got himself _a wand._ 'Stead, turns out it's a bloke who coulda _been_ one of us." She sat back and folded her arms. Remus knew better than to think that the glitter of her eyes was due to tears. "I've kept your secret all these years, Remy, and I'd die before I'd tell a soul. But I gotta say, mate, it's a stab in the back that you've kept all that luck for yourself and _didn' even have the decency to try._"

Oh hell, _to try!_ Remus did put his head in his hands then. To try to break an ancient, intractable curse, where all others had failed? He was a damned good wizard, but still! And it was one thing to run wild through the Forest with Prongs, Padfoot, and Wormtail with the full moon shining down. It was quite another to risk his future so consciously, by making his interest publicly known. To try to get funding for such a politically unwise topic as lycanthropy. His classmates and colleagues weren't complete idiots. And once he'd left school, well...there was always something _else_ to worry over, what with Voldemort on the rise. Lessons to prepare, papers to grade, this or that task to complete for the Order.

"It's not that simple, Mags," he said, ashamed that his voice broke over her name, "it's just not."

Mags surely had a point, even so. Exactly as she'd said, he'd taken his luck--not to mention his wand and his fancy friends and job--and he'd run with it, without so much as a look back.

She was silent for a long time. Then, unexpectedly, she touched his hand. "I know it's not, Remy, really I do." He looked up at her and was surprised to find her smiling. A genuine, if sad, smile. "For good or ill, you're livin' in a place now that I'll never have to go. Walkin' a path I couldn't never walk, in a million years. Hiding who you are from the people you know. Maybe even the people you love." Mags shook her head slightly. "It's not the sorta thing I could do, you know? So, whiles I might give you the piss over it, and I might be mad as hell, at the end o' the day, I reckon it's a good thing that it was you up there at Hogwarts, rather'n me."

He felt jolted to the core by the bitter hopelessness in her voice. "No, Mags, that's not true," he said, covering her hand with his. "You'd have been bloody brilliant." And she would have been, too. If only.

She shrugged. "Maybe so, maybe no. It was you all the same. Listen, never mind all that." She squeezed his hand and somehow he knew then that things had been set right between them. "Now that you know it's for real, not just a lie they've made up to shake us down one more time. I want you to know: they've still got some slots open, to be part of the testing.

A sharp pain lanced through his chest. Remus closed his eyes and the pub noise faded into the distance.

"Mister Es takes us in lots, each lot gets a potion that's jus' a bit different than the others. Helps him to get it right, ya see?" Mags said earnestly.

Somehow, it seemed that he could hear Dumbledore's voice in his mind.

"Sometimes it is best that change happen incrementally, my boy, Dumbledore had told him once, when he'd complained about yet another maddening bit of legislation against werewolves from the Ministry. "Don't underestimate your ability to profoundly change what people think about werewolves, Remus, even if it is only one person at a time."

"I know we've had words over the years and all, and you might not be needin' the money, but the _Wolfsbane,_ Remy." She clenched his hand tightly.

"Wouldn't change a thing about you, Moony, just remember that," Sirius had told him once. The moon had set hours earlier and they'd lain together in a sweaty heap in the shed Sirius rented out in the countryside. Too exhausted to reply, Remus had lain still, listened to the steady thump of Sirius's heart beneath his ear, and marveled. That despite their troubles and misunderstandings, in spite of the 'prank' that had nearly finished them off for good, that when all was said and done, Dumbledore had been right. One person at a time. How perfect it was that one of those people whose lives he'd touched loved him so very much.

"This is _the Wolfsbane!_"

Oh, everyone knew it was only a ruse. Everyone in the Order, that is. That Voldemort courted every disenfranchised group for his army with tailor made lies. That he called for revolution, not evolution. No more hiding: from inherently inferior Muggles, from inept Ministry bureaucrats, from the forces of mediocrity and waste.

Remus was smarter than to fall for that, wasn't he? He was responsible. He was willing to sacrifice for the greater good. He was _not_ small-minded and selfish.

Was he?

"Remy? Hey, mate. You okay?"

Remus blinked. And suddenly, the pub chatter and the heat and the smells rushed back and rolled over him in a heavy, fetid wave. He nodded slowly. "I'm fine, Mags. Just...just thinking."

She nodded seriously. "Oh, I know, it's a whole lot to take in, innit? Took me a good long while to be convinced. Hell, took me ages to take that friend up on his offer." She downed the rest of the beer in a single gulp. "Then, I got to thinking. 'Bout Colleen, ya see? And I thought, what _wouldn't_ I do to give her a better chance? What _wouldn't_ I risk to maybe make the world just that little bit better for me moon mates, for the people I love, for friends like you?"

Remus took a deep, shivering breath. For some reason, his eyes and his throat stung.

"'S not like the Ministry gives two gobs of spit 'bout people like us. So why _not_ take a chance?" Her eyes darkened, she looked around carefully, and lowered her voice. Remus knew right then that she wasn't only talking about the Wolfsbane. "Why _not_ throw in my lot with the blokes who're fightin' _my_ fight, eh?"

They stared at one another, and the longer the silence between them spun out, the greater and more potent Remus's terror became.

_Why _not_ take that chance, Remy? Isn't this your fight too? Isn't this more rightfully your fight than any other? How long must you wait to see that change? How many lives, one by one, like pearls on a string, must you change, how many years must you wait before the people who matter will make the changes that matter to you? How long will you wait, like a good little boy, when you could _seize_ what you want now?_

People had yet to admit it openly, but Remus knew there was a war on. And despite the people who'd vanished or been tortured or turned up mysteriously dead, never had he known the truth of it more keenly than tonight. There was no obvious battlefield, with opposing forces dressed in bold colors. No, this war--perhaps _every war ever fought_\--was waged in shadowed nooks and crannies: in the hearts and minds of the people. And for him, Remus realized, it would be fought in the in the tiny, unspoken gap between love and the possibility of freedom.

Mags shattered his thoughts with a bright, honest smile and the slap of her palm against the table. "No need to decide it all tonight, eh? Let it steep a while. Owl me when you decide." She turned to flag down the barmaid. "Let me order another round and I'll let you tell me all about this new gig of yours that's got you set up so fine."

...

> "Really?" said Lupin, looking only mildly interested as he took another gulp of potion.
> 
> "Some people reckon --" Harry hesitated, then plunged recklessly on, "some people reckon he'd do anything to get the Defense Against the Dark Arts job."
> 
> Lupin drained the goblet and pulled a face.
> 
> "Disgusting," he said. "Well, Harry, I'd better get back to work. see you at the feast later."

...

Remus opened his mouth to protest but the words stuck in his throat. The short hairs on the back of neck stood on end. It was only a trick of the wavering torchlight in the pub but for a moment, he had seen the faintest image of...someone else overlaid upon Mags's lean, rosy profile. Sallow skin, a hooked nose, and long, greasy black hair. In that instant, his terror drained away and was replaced by a belly full of dull throbbing despair. He knew down to the marrow of his bones that for him this battle had already been lost years ago. Long before he'd been aware there was to be a war at all.

"The choices we make are what make us who we are," Dumbledore was fond of saying. Remus's mum's old saying had a different, much darker spin. "Be very careful in whatever you do, Remy," she would tell him, "Because you seal your fate with the choices you make."

He could almost feel the heavy stone door of his tomb swing shut.

Though his face felt frozen, Remus put his hand on Mags's arm and forced an apologetic smile. "I'm sorry, Mags, but I can't stay. I've got a pile of work to get through this evening before bed."

Mags sighed. She was obviously disappointed but seemed not in the least surprised. Even the shame of it couldn't burn its way through Remus's numbness.

"Oh, sure, Remy. No problem," she said, "but hey, you're headed back to Diagon Alley, aren't ya?"

She looked so hopeful and yet resigned that Remus couldn't help but nod.

Mags brightened immediately. "Well then, stop past my place. It's on the way. And you can meet Colleen." Surprisingly, she blushed. "I've told her all 'bout you, Remy. 'Bout what a grand time we had as kids, all the mischief we'd get up to. 'Bout all the things you'd learned at school. It'd be the best if you could drop by."

One choice led to another and another, eliminating other--maybe more palatable--choices along the way. Every choice he'd made and perhaps more especially, every choice he'd _failed_ to make, had brought him to this place.

Until he was left with only a single path to take.

...

> "Right," said Harry, putting down his empty teacup.

...

The lies leapt to his tongue so effortlessly. "Okay, Mags," he said, standing and pulling on his cloak and gloves. "That sounds wonderful. I've been wanting to meet her for ages."

Mags grinned. "Well all right then, mate," she said, "Let's go."

To the obvious relief of the patrons who'd been hovering around their table like vultures, he and Mags vacated the booth and pushed back through the crowd to the doorway.

At the door, he pulled up his hood then followed Mags down the stairs. The streets were still crowded and the temperature had fallen. Large white flakes were floating down, as if powdering the grimy streets with ash.

"This'll be so great, Remy," she said. "Just a left at the end of this block, then a short walk. You won't believe how big Colleen has got."

He should be relieved to be quit of the burden of choosing: love versus freedom, shouldn't he? "I can't even imagine, Mags."

"I swear, she's grown three inches since June. Sweet Merlin, keeping that girl in clothes takes three jobs on its own."

The Order need never question _his_ loyalty, not one tiny bit. He, and Sirius, and James, and Peter had already seen to that. 'Snivellus' Snape would likely chew off his own wand hand before he gave so much as a single drop of his Wolfsbane to one Remus J. Lupin, werewolf. "Children grow fast, don't they?"

"Don't I know it. Wait'll you see her. She's such a little beauty. You're gonna think a bloody veela came to visit."

They were fast approaching the turn off. Remus slipped his wand free of its sheath. "Can't wait," he murmured.

"They all say she's got my eyes. But truth tell, it's my nose she's got. She's got me mum's eyes."

It was better this way, of course. Mags would never _willingly_ share his secret, no. But from what he'd heard, that never stopped Voldemort or his lieutenants. "You mum had cornflower blue eyes, didn't she?"

"You've one helluva bad memory, Remy. Her eyes were brown, hazel. Changed colors with her moods, they did."

Almost there, almost there. Remus fell a step behind Mags and gathered his will. He gathered up his memories of the pub, their conversation, the bad food, bad beer, the taste of hope and savored them one last time. "What can I say? I only remember those marvelous pies she used to make."

"Marvelous! You can't just say 'damned fine' like the rest of us, can you, Remy."

One step behind, two. "Oh, you know me, Mags. Why use a cheap word when an expensive one will do?"

She laughed. "Ha! I _do_ know you, ya prat. And I--"

"_Obliviate!_" he whispered harshly.

Mags stopped, mid-step. The other pedestrians surged forward.

Remus turned on his heel and walked away rapidly.

"Hey! What the hell?" he heard her say. "Watch where you're walkin', you sodding careless bastard!"

...

> The empty goblet was still smoking.

...

Remus didn't look back. His fate had been well and truly sealed.

Up ahead, the steady lights of Diagon Alley beckoned.

**Author's Note:**

> Another "Snape invents the Wolfsbane" story. Quotations are from _Prisoner of Azkaban_, by J. K. Rowling.


End file.
